Rocket Knight Adventures Crazy Hard Walkthrough Created by Sean O'Brien (username El Seph, email: fork@rcsis.com) on 8/7/03 Version 1.0 How many of you have tried the dreaded Crazy Hard mode (or Hard on the other version of the game)? You know, the one where you have 1 life, no continues, and if you get hit by anything, you're dead meat. It's not easy by any means. But I have completed the game on this mode, and my goal is to create a walkthrough that can help those of you who are struggling to finally beat it. The key to beating RKA on Crazy Hard is complete and total memorization of the game. You'll have to know it all to win. Well, are you ready? Here we go. Stage 1 There isn't much to the beginning. You can kill the first groups of pig soldiers simply by standing in place and constantly attacking. Then two pig cars will come: the first one will come from behind you, so turn around and repeatedly attack it. Remember that when an enemy is attacked, they can go right through you without hurting you at all. So if you stand there and attack and don't move while doing it, you'll destroy the car and it won't have touched you at all. The second one comes from the other side, so do the same thing to it. Then charge up and rocket over the pillar in your way. Now this part is a bit trickier: there are two levels, bottom and top, and the pig soldiers can attack you from either one. The ones on top can jump down to the bottom, too. It might be easier to just rocket through this part, but I usually walk fast through it until I see an enemy, then take it out by jumping toward it and attacking. Sometimes up to four or more of them will attack you at once, so just remember to keep attacking until you've taken care of all of them. Once you're past that part, it gets easier, just take them out like you normally do. They will stop appearing once you get to the section with the dead tree. Jump and hang from the tree branch to jump over the pillar or rocket over it. It's your choice. Now keep walking until you see the first pig walker appear. As soon as it jumps into the foreground, get close to it and jump straight up and attack it. Keep jumping and attacking until it's destroyed. Another one will appear from behind soon, so walk until you get to a big hill. If you stand at the top of the hill, this will allow you to take the remaining three walkers easily if you just stand and attack them. They alternate sides, so when you kill one, turn around to face the next one. After they're done with, rocket over the next pillar, then rocket up to the top of the leftmost tree, and slide down and jump off the branch to get the 1up in the air (you'll need EVERY 1up you can get). Then make your way right, and rocket up so you can get to the top of the cliff. Walk forward until the four red-armored pigs appear, then get in the middle of the screen. They will all jump over you, and you can usually hit one of them right before they jump. Kill both of them on one side of you quickly, then turn and face the other side and kill those too. Then when you get to the bridge, be prepared to face the first mini-boss. Mini-boss #1 You can only hurt the driver of the tank, so jump and attack it as soon as it appears from the right side. It'll move back and forth so don't get too close to it. When the top part raises up, it reveals the cannon and fires four cannonballs that will bounce around for a while. You can jump and destroy these cannonballs before they get too far. Then it'll lower back down, and you can attack it like you were doing. When the nose ignites on fire, get away from the stream of flame it's about to shoot. Another strategy is to rocket over the tank as soon as you can, since the tank can't turn around and you can still hit it from there, and its attacks will be really easy to avoid. Once you've hit it six times, I think, the bottom part will blow up and the bridge will break, and you'll fall into the river. The middle is probably the safest place to be at this part, but note that you'll drift slowly to the right, so step to the left to stay in the middle. The tank will come down from the bottom of the screen, spinning around and moving diagonally, rebounding off the sides of the screen. Now you can hit the entire tank, so do so as soon as you can. It will rebound off your attack and head back toward the top of the screen, but it'll come back down. Keep hitting it as it comes back down. If you do it right, you'll be able to trap him in one corner of the screen forever until he dies. In the next area, you fall onto a platform with a rocket pack item on it. Get the item and you'll take off. Stay on the left side of the screen and attack the insect-like enemies (1 hit kills them). They'll come from two different elevations. This part shouldn't be too hard at all. Soon, you'll fight another mini-boss. Mini-boss #2 This mechanical dragon can be killed extremely fast. Watch how it moves up and down, and when its head starts to rise, dive down and attack it a few times, getting as close as you can to the head. Rise back up as its head goes down, then go back down and attack it as it rises again. You should be able to kill it before it actually attacks you. If in the case it does get to the right side of the screen, it'll leap out of the water. Try to attack the head as it comes out, then move to the bottom left corner of the screen. It'll leap out again, getting farther to the left each time. I think it'll do this four times, then repeat the pattern again. It doesn't take too many hits to take it down; again, if you get really close to its head and whack away, you can destroy it fast. Then you bust into the castle. Jump over fire pits when you see them, and don't jump into any fire on the ceiling. Panicking pigs will come after you, and they'll jump over anything they need to, so wait for them to come to you and attack them. Just go slowly through this area and you should be fine. You'll see arrows on the walls telling you what to do next, so follow their advice and rocket diagonally up to get up to the next level. In this area, the screen will automatically scroll to the left, and a wall of fire appears behind you. Keep walking as far to the left as you can go, then when you drop down, duck. All three of the oncoming fire beams will miss you, then continue. This will happen two more times, but on the last one you'll have less time to move from your position before you get squashed. So jump immediately after the last fire beam goes past, and enter the door as it approaches. In the next room, there aren't any enemies, just a bunch of gems that you can rocket diagonally to get. Make your way up to the door. In the next room, there's a set of stairs that pig soldiers will come jumping down. As before, wait for them to come to you, then jump and attack them. Rocket up for some more gems, then climb some more stairs and kill more pigs. Then rocket up for even more gems, and don't forget the 1up at the very top. When you get the gems, you should be standing still instead of jumping when you rocket in the path of the gems; that way, you should land on the lowest step and not accidentally into a soldier. When you climb the next set of stairs, there will be another door. After you enter, you'll find a present, which a pig pops out of. He won't do anything but jump up and down in place, so kill him. Next there will be gems hovering over a fire pit. Get really close to the fire pit and rocket up diagonally. After that, you're safe. Collect all the gems in the room (remember, gems give you lots of points, and you get an extra life at every 60,000 points as well as the first one at 20,000), then drop down and enter the last door. Boss #1 This mechanical centipede has a really set pattern, so it shouldn't be too hard once you figure it out. First it crashes down from the center of the ceiling, hit it as it hits the ground. Then it comes from the left section of the ceiling, so move to the right and hit it. Then the right section of the ceiling, hit it again. It'll fake twice, then crash through the left wall, jump and attack. Then the same with the right wall. Then it'll come back down through the center, so move to the side and hit it again. Then it starts to drop a series of spiky drones, and you won't be able to attack it at this time. Just jump over each pair of drones and they'll climb up the wall and the ceiling. Walk along with them too. Don't go to the other side of the boss, or he'll drop the next set of drones on your side and then you'll have drones going two different directions. Once the screen has been flooded with drones, he sends out this flashing round drone that moves faster than the others. Charge up, and as it draws near you unleash your spin attack on it, and all the drones will be destroyed at once. The boss then comes down from the right section of the ceiling, hit him as usual. Then move all the way to the left, because he comes down from the middle and his tail comes from the right wall. Hit his head as it comes down, then wait for the tail to retract. The head will try to fake you out as the tail is swinging. As it retracts, the head will come down from the middle again, so hit it again. Then move to the right side of the room, because the same thing happens as before, only the tail comes from the left. After that part, the head comes back down from the left section and then the right section, then the left wall, then the right wall. If you've hit the boss at every opportunity up to this point, you've won. If not, it'll start repeating attacks. Stage 2 Did you make it past Stage 1 okay? Good, because at the very beginning of this stage, you get to fight a mini-boss! Mini-boss #1 Try to destroy this robot as fast as possible, because its attacks will get harder to avoid as the fight progresses. Always try to stay near the middle, and jump and pummel its red nose with your regular attack (not your rocket because it's too unpredictable). You should be able to get 2 full sword swings in as you jump. It'll attack with both arms at once, but since this is a fairly quick attack, if you've been attacking the nose the attack should pass right through you. It'll swing with its right arm first (the arm on your right, not his right), so get slightly to the left of the middle. Then comes the left arm, then right, then left. Always move as soon as one arm retracts. Then it'll start to spin its right arm in circles, so kind of "play jump rope" with it and attack when you jump. If you continuously attack it during the whole fight, you should be able to win before it gets to any of its tougher attacks. If you haven't won by this point, it might be a good idea to get to one edge of the screen, charge up, and when you see an opening, rocket toward the nose. He will try to fake you out by seeming to punch with one arm but actually punch with the other, so beware of that. You'll know when he's almost dead when he starts bobbing up and down. After that little skirmish, continue to the right, and when you see three-way shots coming at you, stop, attack the shot in the middle, then attack the pig that fired it. Or, if you prefer not to fight them, just dive to the bottom of the screen and continue right. All the shots will go right over you. Then you'll approach a waterfall, with vines growing in certain areas. The two robotic bats here may give you problems, but there are ways of dealing with them. Move forward along the bottom until you see the first bat. I use the vines to jump up toward the vine it's hanging on and then attack it before it can do anything. If you don't like that, you can always rocket into it, then wait for it to come near you, then jump and attack it. After you've dealt with it, jump up the vines and make your way to the top-left, collecting all the gems. Killing the second bat can be tricky, since there's a dip in the vine it's hanging on, and if you go too far forward you'll slip right into your opponent. So try to jump onto the very right edge of the vine and attack it from there, and it will merely sit there and die. Having killed it, get to the left edge of the vine and jump off to get the 1up, very similar to the one in the first stage. After you fall back down, you can just rocket up diagonally to the right and continue on your way. Eventually the vine you're climbing on will end, and it looks as though you're stuck. Not so. Rocket straight over to the right and you'll land on another vine. From here you'll find rotating platforms that go in and out of the waterfall. Jump on one and stay on it until you go behind the waterfall, then climb the dark vines in the background over to the right, avoiding any spikes in the background. You'll find a stationary platform, and when you jump on it you'll go back into the foreground. Jump up to the topmost vine you see, then rocket across to another vine on the other side. Here comes another mini-boss. Mini-boss #2 Drop down to the platform on the right to go behind the waterfall. Then jump up to the vine in the background, and attack the red orb on the snake's tail to damage it as it spirals downward. Then it'll come up after you, so rocket to the left and get on the very right edge of the vine, and attack it at every opportunity. It won't hit you once if you're on that vine, at least for now. Just keep attacking it until you see it go up from the bottom of the screen in the foreground. When it does this, get to the middle of the vine and charge up. It'll go into the background and pass right under you, when the tail passes use a spin attack. Then after it passes, rocket over to the right vine again, just so that the mini-boss will repeat its pattern. Usually I can kill it before it gets to this point, but if you haven't done so it'll come up from the bottom of the screen after you again, so rocket over to the left, get on the right edge of the vine and attack. It seems more complicated than it really is. Luckily, there are no more mini-bosses in this stage. Get back into the foreground after beating the snake and follow the vines over to the cave. This next part is kind of different. Drop down into the water. You have to hang by the poles to avoid floating back up to the top, or into one of those spinning spikes. Dive down to the next pole until it's safe, and keep doing that until you get to the bottom. Now you have to go up again, but stay as far to the left as possible and try not to go right at all. Float up past the spikes when it's safe, and float in place by tapping down to avoid hitting the next spike. When you get to the top, if you've stayed to the left, the bat at the top will be just sitting there and you can easily take it out. If not, watch out for it and jump up to attack it only when safe. After it's gone, float as far right as you can, charge up and rocket diagonally up into the wall you're up against. You'll land on a pole up top, where you can collect some gems and take out another bat without any danger. Then drop down into the water and do the same thing that you did before, by hanging onto the poles and dropping down when safe. This time, at the bottom, there will be some spikes above you, and they will drop down when you pass under them, so get as low as you can. Once they're gone, float back up, staying to the left again to avoid the remaining spikes. Then continue into the next room. For this part, just stay at the bottom where the spikes are low, and follow it over to the edge of the screen, and exit. Now comes the mine cart ride. Hop on and duck when you get to the signs with the "!"s to avoid the spikes above. Next, you'll be traveling straight and pigs will attack you from both sides of the screen, throwing bombs up into the air. The faster you kill them, the better chance you have of living, so here's the order they appear in: right, left, right, left, right, right, left, right, left, right, left, right, left, left. Then the cart will flash and signs with "X"s appear. Jump off to the left and you'll land on the roof of a house. Go over to the very left and you'll see a 1up. Getting this one requires good timing: you have to jump off to the left of the 1up and rocket diagonally toward it, but don't aim directly at it, aim a bit higher so you don't rebound off the house and instead land on the roof again. Stand in the middle and rocket diagonally to land on the next roof, then jump onto the next cart. Duck the spikes, then when the cart flashes, wait until it gets to the end of the track, then jump off onto the next cart. You have to do this a few times, with the track you're on getting shorter each time. Eventually you get to another cart that doesn't fall off (for a while, at least), so as soon as you get on it, duck the oncoming spikes. After that, several pig soldiers in carts will come from the left on a track above you and drop bombs straight down. If you get to the middle of the screen and keep jumping and attacking them, you'll be fine. There are quite a few of them, so don't stop attacking until you're sure they're all gone. Then you go through a house and a bunch of chickens fly out, one of them will hover around you. Just ignore it. The cart will flash and slow down, but don't jump off just yet. Get ready when you see the X signs, and when you see the end of the track, jump off to the right. Then jump onto the final mine cart and face the boss. Boss #2 The train will approach you from the left, so start attacking as soon as it appears. All it can do in this phase is fire straight shots at you. Jump over them and continue attacking. If you get close enough to where you can hit it directly with your sword, you'll do even more damage. I can get in four sword swings between the train's shots. Just remember to back up after you attack, then jump forward over the shots. If the train gets too far to the right, rocket over it, but if you attack it close up, that shouldn't happen. You'll destroy the cannon in front and it'll retreat. Next, a higher track appears, and the train will appear on that track, and its hands will swing at you. One of them swings in a wide arc, back and forth, while the other makes a more circular motion. Study their patterns and get close to the hands to slash them up. You can stay far away and hit them with your shots, but you won't do as much damage. The train will slowly move toward the right edge, then head back toward the middle, so adjust your position to be able to attack the hands constantly. And don't jump, you'll likely end up hitting the train. I've been able to destroy the hands before he gets to this next attack, but if he does, follow this advice. His hands will go up toward him, and reach out at you. Get over to the right side of the screen and charge up. When the first hand reaches, do nothing, it'll miss. When the second one reaches, use the spin attack on it. Then charge up again while the first hand reaches again, and spin attack again when the second one reaches, then quickly get over to the middle of the screen, because both hands come sweeping down from both sides but will miss you if you're in the middle. Then the hands repeat the motion they were going in before. Once the hands are destroyed, the train will head over to the right, and the upper track will disappear, meaning the train is on your track again. This time it approaches from the right, firing shots into the air that bounce along the ground. Stay close to it and slash away, unless one of the shots is going to land on top of you. In that case, back away and move under it or jump over it when it's safe. In any case, don't let a bunch of the shots trap you on the left side of the screen, so don't wait too long to move. Again, if the train starts to close you in, rocket over it, but again, that shouldn't be a problem if you're attacking it up close. If you keep up your onslaught, it'll die soon. Stage 3 Things will get rough in this stage. In the first area, there are no enemies, but the rising and falling lava may cause problems. Just stay on high ground until it lowers, then move across the low ground as quickly as possible before it rises back up again. If you're patient, it shouldn't be too hard. The tricky part is the part with the platforms. You can't see them until you see their reflection in the lava, so look before you leap. Or, you can do what I do. I stay on the ledge closest to the first platform until the lava lowers, then jump as high as I can and rocket straight forward. You should land on a low platform, jump off it as soon as you land, onto the next, higher platform. Wait for the lava to lower again, then jump forward and rocket forward. You should catch the 1up on the way over. Quickly get to high ground, wait for the lava to lower again, and progress to the door to the next area. Now THIS is the hard part. The water here continuously rises and falls, while you weave through several sets of spikes as well as contend with tons of little fish. These guys are quick and can leap out of the water at you. There IS a pattern to the order they appear in, but it's really hard to follow. I'll try to be specific here, hopefully it'll be understandable. The first one should leap at you, slash it when it gets close. The water will rise, so go above the first spikes, then dive down under the next, but hesitate slightly before you go because a fish will come from the bottom in that area. Then go forward under the spikes and kill the next fish that approaches, then as the water rises head over the next spikes. You'll have to wait for the water to lower and rise again to get over the next spikes, so stay low and attack any fish that approach. Then go over the next spikes, but be careful, as a few fish may have congregated on the other side of the spikes by this point, and if you're not careful you'll run right into them as the water lowers. Try to dive down as quickly as possible at this part so you can be on the same level as the fish and destroy them. For the next part, you should be able to go really fast, weaving in and out of the spikes, but the fish aren't done with you yet. Quick reflexes are a necessity, you must kill the fish as soon as you see them or they may run right into you. Eventually you'll reach some tall spikes with a banana on the other side. Defend yourself while the water rises, and when it gets to the top, get over the spikes immediately, because once you cross this area, the fish will all disappear. It gets much easier from here.well, as long as you have good maneuvering skills. Go over the next spikes, then wait for the water to fall and rise again before entering the next part. The spikes zigzag downward, and you have to travel between them as the water falls (you'll probably screw up if you try to dive down yourself, so wait for the water to take you down). When you get to the bottom (and you're sure that you're safe), dive all the way down and forward under the spikes into the next opening. Charge up here, and when you're fully charged, wait for the water to get to the very top, then move forward just a tad then rocket straight across. You should land on the other side of the tall spikes, and hopefully you didn't go too far into the spikes ahead. Then rise up over the next spikes and dive down between the spikes at the edge of the screen into the next area. Mini-boss There are many ways to go about this fight, but I found this way to be the easiest. After the little explosion, a pig in a crab robot slowly rises up from the bottom of the screen. Continuously rocket into the middle where the pig is, until the robot is almost into position. Then get over to the right side of the screen, floating above the right arm. As soon as the arm starts to move to the left, get down there and slash away at the arm. You'll float back up, so dive back down as soon as the arm moves to the left again. You'll get in lots of hits doing this, and the right arm should go down fast. Now you'll have almost the whole right side of the screen to yourself, which makes the rest of this fight much easier. Stay in the upper right corner most of the time. Charge up, and when you see the left hand open up, it's about to reach right at you, so rocket diagonally down into the pig. You'll avoid the arm's attack and damage the pig at the same time. You should be able to fit in about two more rockets just like that before the arm reaches at you again. So wait for it to open up, then rocket into the pig. Then rocket again, and again, then charge up and wait for the hand to open up again, then rocket again. If you keep this pattern up, you'll destroy the robot. Don't destroy the left arm, because if you do, the robot will send up these little blue rings after you. It's not worth it to risk getting hit with projectiles, so leave that arm alone. Proceed into the door at the bottom when it opens. In the next room, jump onto the walker and it'll start walking down into the lava, but you'll be above the lava safe and sound, with the exception of the occasional robot bat swooping down after you. If you just stand and attack them, you should be fine. When the walker reaches land, fall off the walker ahead of it to land on the ground and get under the spikes. I usually just avoid the bats at these parts. Then when the walker descends into the lava again, jump back on it. You'll have to repeat this a few times before you get to the end, but it isn't too different each time. Boss #3 This mechanical fish can't be hurt directly, so most of the time you'll be jumping on platforms avoiding a fiery fate with the lava. Stay on the platform you begin on until it's just about to enter the fish's mouth, then jump to the upper platforms that are coming toward you. The platforms on the bottom will speed up, so take this into consideration before you make your next jump onto one of them. Then when that one gets close to the boss, jump off it onto another high platform before the lower platforms get really fast. Wait on your current platform for them to slow down again, then jump down to a lower one, then back up to one of the higher ones. Then the platforms will stop moving, and the fish goes back into the lava. Jump straight up from the platform you're on as soon as they start to fall, and you'll land on another platform (you should be to the left of the opening in the middle where the fish comes out of). It'll open its mouth and spew a bunch of little fireballs that aren't too tough to avoid, just move back and forth on the ground. He also spews bananas, which are of little importance. After four consecutive spews, the pig soldier controlling the fish will jump out. Get close to him and jump with him, repeatedly attacking him as he falls back into the fish. Now rocket over to the right side of the screen, since the fish comes from the left. Your platform will move toward him as before, but this time the platforms coming from above will change speeds as well. Keep jumping up them as if they were stairs, and try to remember how long it takes for the platforms to change speeds. You should be skipping several platforms at a time when they go really fast, there isn't enough time to land on each of them. Then they will slow down like before, and you'll have to jump when the platforms fall like before, only you'll be on the right side of the fish this time, which is a bit safer since more bananas appear on that side. Attack the pig as he comes out again. Then rocket back over to the left, and the boss will start the pattern from the beginning again. You should be able to kill the boss the next time the pig comes out if you've been hitting it enough times. If not, just repeat what you've already done. Stage 4 This is one of the shorter stages in the game, and as long as you know what you're doing, it shouldn't be incredibly hard. As soon as you enter the Big Barone, you'll find what looks to be Princess Sherry behind a barrier, but he is revealed as Captain Fleagle, and you'll have to fight him. Mini-boss #1 The hardest part of this fight is figuring out how to hit him. You can't attack him directly because of the barrier, but notice how he can throw those bombs at you. Well, hit him with a dose of his own medicine, then. Stay a little left of the middle of the screen and jump and reflect his bombs back at him with your attacks. Notice that the trajectory of the reflected bombs will change depending where on the bomb you hit it: if you hit the top of the bomb, it flies straight and low, and if you hit the bottom of it, it kind of bounces upward. Use whatever you need to beat him. After several hits, he'll retreat, and the barrier disappears. Follow him and rocket up through the opening in the battleship. This part can be seemingly hard, but there's a pattern to be learned. You're on top of the Big Barone, and you have to keep moving forward or you'll fly backward into one of the poles. So press and hold right before the screen even fades in, and don't let go of it. The captain will chuck barrels at you, and they either roll on the ground or bounce toward you. Jump over the rolling ones and just walk right under the bouncing ones. Here's the pattern to the barrels: roll, bounce, roll, roll, roll, bounce, bounce, bounce. If you keep going forward the entire time, after the last barrel in the pattern I described you'll find Captain Fleagle. Just attack him once and he'll run off again. Keep going forward and drop onto the nose of the ship, which is right in front of the cockpit where Axle and Sherry are. It'll fall off, and as it's falling walk left. You'll fall onto a rail, which you'll hang from. Make your way across the various rails, and destroy the bomb enemies that move back and forth along the rails. You shouldn't be in any danger with them. Eventually you'll see a 1up below one of the rails. Charge up, drop down to get the 1up and rocket back up while you're falling. Soon after the 1up you face another mini- boss. Mini-boss #2 As the robotic pig head flies across the screen the first time, you can't hit it and it can't hit you. However, as it comes back from the left, you CAN hit it, so get all the way over to the left and swing wildly at it. Then when it gets below you, it'll start hovering back and forth, stop right under you, and attempt to blast you with fire. All you have to do is move one direction or the other to avoid it. After three fire blasts, it'll just hover back and forth while bomb enemies drop onto your rail from above. Attack them and they'll fall off, and try to make it so that they hit the mini-boss as they fall. That's how you'll do damage. After the bomb enemies stop coming, it'll try to burn you again, and the pattern repeats. The only danger here is getting swamped by the bombs. Save yourself before trying to attack the mini- boss, then only when its safe should you attempt to do damage. Continue to the left, and you'll find a platform which, when stepped on, will swing you over to another platform, which you'll have to jump to. It may seem okay to jump when the platform stops swinging, but you'll probably miss if you do. Instead, jump a little before it stops swinging, except on the last one, since the door is stationary and you'll need to get as close to it as possible before you jump. Once inside the battleship, you'll go down a long narrow corridor, and several pigs with bazookas will come toward you, pause, and fire. The shots can be ducked, but remember that the pigs pause just in range of your attack, so you can defeat them before they fire. If that was all you had to do, this section would be no problem, but you also have to pass a series of several barriers, which constantly turn on and off. Just don't get impatient here. Wait for a barrier to turn on, then turn off again before you proceed. Know how long it takes for them to turn on and off. Also, there are a couple parts where there are two barriers really close together and you can barely fit between them. If they both turn off at about the same time, then consider yourself lucky and pass through both of them. But that doesn't always happen, so master the art of getting between them. Moderation is the key, don't go too fast and don't go too slow. When the corridor opens up and you see a banana above you, you're in the clear, so just go forward to the next room. Boss #4 Captain Fleagle will run toward the right and a giant robot that looks kind of like him drops down. At the beginning, just stay where you started and you'll be fine. He stomps twice and junk falls down in the center of the screen. When he starts wavering back and forth faster and faster, that's your cue to get ready to move. Lots of junk will fall down from the ceiling, and you've got to walk back and forth through it as it falls down around you. I tend to stay on the very left and move right only when something's about to fall on top of me. The junk does fall down in a pattern, but it's a different pattern each time, so if you can become acquainted with each pattern you can avoid getting hit. After he stops wavering, get kind of close to him, and when his mid- section opens up, attack the red core in the middle, but do it quickly because he fires a huge shot horizontally. He fires five shots, so get a hit in between each one, but don't try to hit him again after the fifth shot. Instead, back all the way up to the left and duck, since that is the only way to avoid his array of shots that he fires immediately after the fifth one. After it clears, the mid-section will close and he makes more junk fall. You can do the same thing as before in this part of the fight, stay to the left and move right only when necessary. Then the mid-section opens up again and do what you did before. In the third "junk drop", I find it better to stay closer to the robot, and move left when necessary. More junk drops toward the left this time, so it's not as safe. You should be able to finish off the robot the next time it opens its mid-section, if you've hit it every possible time that is. But the fight isn't over when the robot goes down. Captain Fleagle will run across the room and back, and continue to do that until you kill him. Stay in the left quarter of the screen and slash him when he gets right next to you. He'll jump over you, then come back after you, so turn around and slash again. If you slash every time he gets near you, you shouldn't get hit by him. Just remember that he jumps every time you attack. Stage 5 This stage starts off with a flying section. As the stage opens, fly to the upper right corner. This will allow you to dodge the first two missile attacks, but the next two require good piloting skills. The third attack comes diagonally at you. Move a little to the left, and when the gap between the missiles gets right under you, quickly move down. If you survive, the fourth attack will come straight up, but you shouldn't have to move much to get between the missiles here. After it passes, move all the way to the left to avoid all the incoming shots. None of them should hit you over there. Then several pig soldiers hanging on balloons come floating in from the right. Just take them each down with one shot. After they're all gone, missiles will fire vertically from each side of the screen and close in. Get in the middle of the missiles and follow them as they weave to the left, then right, and then back left again. When you get close to the middle of the screen, three missiles instead of two will come up after you, and the gaps between them are REALLY small, but you can fit. I always try to go between the middle and right missiles. Just make sure you are right in the middle of the gap. This part may take several tries to get down perfectly. If you live, immediately get all the way to the left to avoid the faster missiles. Then move over to where the leftmost missile was in order to avoid the next attack, then back all the way to the left, then right again, and keep doing that until you see the missile in the middle come up with the panicking pig riding on it. Keep in mind that in the whole flying section, if you get hit once, you're starting the whole thing over again. Thankfully, once you've gotten to this part, the worst is over, but don't get too cocky. Mini-boss #1 As you descend down to the streets of the city, get in the lower left corner, as your next foe will come in diagonally from the upper left. After it passes, move up, because it comes across the bottom. When it gets to the left edge, it'll fire several times (you're already above it so this shouldn't matter at all) and then go back to the right. It then comes back, staying on the right side of the screen, and fires lasers periodically. In between shots, go down and hit it once or twice, then get back up. Keep doing this until it starts firing walls of lasers. Move through the gaps in the lasers, and try not to worry about hitting the mini-boss right now (although if you can, do so). After the walls of lasers, it'll pause, so you'll be able to hit it several times before it zooms to the left, and that's when you should go back up again. It'll walk backwards, so get down as soon as you can and hit it some more. After a few seconds, it'll zoom forward again, so go back up again. Then it jumps back to the right, and starts firing again. Like before, go down in between shots and hit it. It'll start heading left as it fires, so watch out when it gets close and go back up again. Attack it when it does nothing and go back up when it gets close again. Then it'll head back to the right and repeat its pattern. Eventually, its legs get blown off, and it'll come back hovering in the middle of the screen. This part is simple: stay to the left and attack. Its arms should completely miss you if you're all the way to the left. It gets destroyed in a hurry. Then you enter the Devotindos castle. In the first room, walk forward and grab the easiest 1up in the game, and charge up as you continue to walk. When you see the invincible armored pig appear, rocket diagonally over it. Or, if you're more patient, just walk forward until you see it come after you, go back to the platform, and jump over the pig as it walks below. In any case, you'll reach the teleporter at the right end of the screen. In the second room, you have to descend all the way to the bottom before the armored pigs do. If you don't, you're history. Just fall as fast as you can, pressing the down arrow and the jump button when you land on a platform. Get into the teleporter before your foes pass it. In the next room, rocket past the armored pigs, who will fall down after you pass under them. Just follow the path, jumping when necessary, and jump on the red button at the end to make the bridge disappear as well as the barrier blocking the next teleporter. Mini-boss #2 Ok, so this part isn't really a mini-boss, but it plays mini-boss music, so I'm including it as one. Destroy the spiked pillar then get under the open part of the ceiling, since everything will scroll down but you. Then move to the left to avoid getting squashed, then back to the right, and jump on the platforms as soon as you can and jump to the left as soon as you can. Be charged up when you get all the way to the left, because the next part is narrow and you'll need to jump and rocket through. You bounce back a little when you hit the right wall, so be right on the left wall when you jump and rocket. Otherwise, you'll get smashed. Then get back to the left when you can and jump up the platforms as before, and jump to the right when possible, getting the 1up. You have to jump to the right as soon as you can, or you will die. That's what the 1up is there for, so you can perfect this part. Once you're over to the right again, charge up, then jump and rocket to the left, charge up again, jump and rocket right, charge up again and jump and rocket left into the teleporter. In the next room, you'll see a platform that automatically starts going right when you stand on it. Attack the up arrow to make it go diagonally up, or the down arrow to make it go diagonally down. Attacking the opposite arrow while it is going diagonally will make the platform go horizontal again. Use this room to get acquainted with how the platform works. If you fall off, you can always go back to the left and jump up the platforms to get back to the moving platform. When ready, hop on and attack the down arrow to go under the wall, then when you're low enough attack the up arrow to go horizontal again. After you pass under the wall, attack the up arrow to head up toward the next teleporter, and jump off when you get to it. Now comes the real test. You have to navigate your platform through several spikes. You can just follow the trail of gems and you won't run into anything. There's also a 1up here, but this is probably the hardest 1up in the game, so don't go after it unless you're sure of your abilities. You have to go up at the only split path in the room, then dive down to get the 1up and quickly go back up to avoid crashing into the spikes. Also, the last part is rather narrow, so you have little room for error. Jump into the next teleporter to face. Boss #5 .one of the hardest bosses in the game. You'll see Axle Gear standing right next to you, but he soon jumps into a GIANT pig robot behind him that rises up. Charge up, and as soon as the door to your left opens up, rocket forward. Charge up again as soon as you finish, then rocket diagonally up through the platforms. Rocket forward again ASAP, then rocket diagonally up again through the next set of platforms. In the next section, charge up, but don't rocket just yet. Walk to the edge of the ledge you're on, jump off, then as you start to fall, rocket diagonally up. Then charge up again as you're going down the "stairs". As soon as you see the next platforms, jump onto them and rocket straight into the 1up (if you're chicken, you can keep going to the left and rocket diagonally up that way, but you'll miss out on unlimited lives if you do that). Continue to the left and walk, don't jump, across the platforms that fall as you step on them. At the end, you get to step into your own robot, and finally, the fight actually begins. All you can do in the robot is move back and forth and punch. At the beginning, Axle Gear will try to advance on you, but he won't attack you until he's right next to you, so you should be able to hit him easily the first 5 times. After the 5th hit, back up constantly until he pauses, and back up all the way to the left wall and stop there. He will then come back toward you, but this time, he won't attack only when he gets right next to you. He'll attack the moment he is able to reach you. The only way I found that it's possible to beat him at this part is to sit where you are, and press the attack button right before he gets in range of your punch. He should walk right into that range and get hit. Then he'll pause and do that again. Now he will back up for about 4 or 5 steps, and then advance on you again. Stand your ground and try to time your attacks just right so that he barely gets hit. If you punch too early, you'll miss and he'll counterattack. If you're too late, you'll both get hit, but you still die, or sometimes you even miss altogether even though it looks like you hit him. So if you think you're doing it right but it's not working, try attacking a little earlier. He will do this two more times before he's defeated. The timing is really hard to perfect. At least you can get unlimited lives by getting the 1up every time you die. Plus, the gems you collect give you points, so if you need more lives, just fight Axle Gear over and over again until you get enough. Stage 6 Ahhh, Stage 6.I had more troubles here than anywhere else. The whole stage is a flying section, and the ONLY checkpoint is right before the boss. If you die any earlier than that, you start the whole stage over again. It's really hard. Anyway, here we go.the beginning is simple enough, 5 pig heads fly toward you from the top right corner of the screen, just get up there at the beginning and attack them all. Then 5 more will come from the bottom, do the same thing. Then 5 more from the top and 5 more from the bottom. They can fire at you, so don't dawdle, move around their shots. Collecting the apples actually makes the stage go faster, believe it or not. Try it yourself. In the next part, two columns of four pig heads each will move up and down and fire. Before that part, get close to the right side of the screen and start attacking. You should be able to take out a few of them as soon as they appear. Then move up or down to finish off the rest in the first column before they can fire at you, then attack the second column while avoiding their shots. That whole first part isn't much to speak of, but here's where things start to get rough.the asteroid field. As far as I can tell, there is NO pattern to the way the asteroids fly at you, so all I can do here is give a few general tips. Asteroids can either come slowly at you from the right, or quickly from the left. Any from the right can be deflected with an attack, but the left ones have to be avoided by moving up or down. You'll have to concentrate on both sides at once. There are also stationary asteroids with little cannons on them. These are the only ones that can be destroyed, and do so as soon as you see one, because if you don't, they fire five homing missiles at you. If you're fired upon, go up or down and to the right, then destroy the missiles as they circle back around toward you. Occasionally the top or bottom of the screen will obscure one of those asteroids, and you won't know it's there until you're fired at. There's not much I can say to help you here, since it always comes as a surprise. You'll have to dodge the missiles as well as any asteroids. All I can say is that I hope you have a lot of lives at this part, and hope that this doesn't happen. If you make it past that part, you'll have a brief moment of silence, then a ring of pig heads and asteroids will close in on you. If you hit one target, the whole ring is destroyed. Try to hit one of the asteroids, because you'll get apples, as opposed to being attacked by a bunch of pig heads that could kill you if you're not careful. Next up is. Mini-boss #1 This robot can become easy with practice, but you'll probably have to die a few times first before you get it down. It comes in from the top with its shield raised, fly to the bottom left corner and it'll miss you. Then it backs up, so attack it while it does this. Then it'll charge with its shield again, move up to avoid, then it backs up again, so attack it again. Then it'll charge one more time, and when it backs up, it won't lower its shield just yet. Take this moment to get in the middle of the screen, parallel with the robot. It'll then fire pairs of lasers at you, and the only really effective way to avoid them is to stay between them. If you have to make any movements up or down, make them subtle because the robot will follow you. However, if you can get exactly in the middle, you won't have to move at all. While the lasers are being fired, close in on it and attack it directly. It's possible to defeat the mini-boss immediately by doing this. If you don't defeat it, then after the lasers, it may charge with its shield again, so back up just in case. If it doesn't, then it'll pause for a while, and then the spiked ball attached to it will come out at you, so be moving when it launches. The ball will just float there for a while, so use this opportunity to get in the robot's face and hopefully destroy it. If you still haven't beaten it by now, it'll repeat its attacks. After the explosion subsides, get in the middle of the screen again for another ring of asteroids and pig heads. Again, try to hit one of the asteroids. After that's over, get ready for another mini-boss. Mini-boss #2 This is one of the hardest parts of Crazy Hard, and it happens to be very close to the end of this stage, meaning if you die here (which you probably will) you'll be repeating the whole stage again. It's incredibly annoying. Anyway, a couple of pigs in space suits will hover in slowly, then stop and either fire three straight shots at you or swing a spiked arm around. Move up or down to avoid the shots, and move away from the enemy to avoid the arm. They each take about 5 hits before they die, but if you can get up close to them and hack away they go down faster. Soon after you kill them (or maybe even before you kill them) Axle Gear will zoom in. Start attacking him immediately, and stay close to him. You'll probably be fired upon by another pig as you do this, so watch out. Get several hits in on him, then move all the way to the top right or bottom right corner of the screen. Axle fires a gigantic beam that WILL hit you unless you're in one of those corners. Hopefully he will take out any remaining pigs with the blast. And you can't hit him during this, so don't even try. Then he leaves, and there will be a brief moment of silence. Then he comes back, going all the way to the left. Follow him backward and attack, but when he gets all the way to the left, get away, because he fires a missile at you. More pigs will probably have appeared by now, so head toward them and kill them, unless they're attacking at the time. In that case you're gonna have to dodge two things at once. Axle will move to another part of the screen (I think it's random, but if he comes toward you, move) and then fire two missiles. If you can, get to the left and destroy them as they approach. He then moves again, and fires three missiles. It might be good to go through a gap in the missiles and then destroy them as they circle back around toward you. And don't forget the pig soldiers.that's why this part is so hard, because you have to concentrate on too many things at once. If you survive the third missile attack, he'll leave again, and then come back with his beam prepared like he did last time. He also stalls again like last time, so beat him up as much as you can before he fires. If at all possible, this is the best time to finish him off. If not, you might have to endure some more missiles, which would increase your chances of losing. He'll flee once you win. A third circle of pig heads and asteroids come in, do exactly what you did before. If you've made it this far and you don't get killed by anything, congratulations, you've made it to the only checkpoint in the stage. The rest should be all downhill from here, because if the boss kills you, you won't have to go through all the rest of the stage. Boss #6 This fight is FUN. I love long, grueling battles like these with multiple steps required to defeat the boss. When you see the screen flash red, get to the upper left corner of the screen. When the battleship appears, it'll fire at you from its top cannons. Inch forward to avoid the shots, then before the boss gets too far to the right, move all the way right and down under the ship, and get on the left side of the bottom cannon so it can't hit you. The ship will continue to go the way it was going until a certain height, then drift straight downward. As it's doing this, you should be underneath and slightly to the left of the bottom cannon and attacking it. Move with the ship to avoid getting hit. You ought to be able to destroy the cannon before the ship smashes you at the bottom of the screen. If not, it could cause problems for you later. Move left whenever you need to, wait in the bottom left corner for a bit, then go all the way up past the leftmost cannon (you can attack it if you want, but you probably won't destroy it and it's pretty insignificant anyway). Then go a bit left to be right over the propellers, so that none of the cannons can fire at you. Then when the ship has moved all the way left and starts moving up, head right and go under the ship again. Get to the bottom left corner and just stay there for a bit. The ship will teleport and reappear, but if you're in the corner it won't touch you. It teleports again, and as it reappears, go up and attack one of the two cannons while inching downward to avoid their shots. You probably won't be able to destroy either of them at this part, but it helps to get the hits in for later. When it teleports again, it'll reappear in the upper right corner, slowly descend for a bit, and then a hatch opens up that sends out enemies that fire spread shots rather quickly at you. To avoid dealing with them, stay right underneath the ship, and the moment the hatch opens, start attacking and you should be able to kill the first enemy that comes out before it can attack. If successful, get up right next to the hatch and continuously slash away at it. It'll be destroyed before long. As soon as it's gone, the ship teleports again. When you see it start to reform, get right underneath the chin of the pig face at the front of the ship. When it fully reforms, an orange orb will open up on the chin. As soon as you see it, start hacking away, and follow the ship as it goes over to the right side of the screen. It'll then start to descend toward you, so move down with it. If you attack it enough times, you can destroy the chin before the ship gets to the bottom of the screen. If not, you should head upwards and start attacking the cannons on top, and stay high. If the ship stops, that means it's going to try to ram you, so go underneath it and attack while it charges. The reason you wanted to stay high previously is because if the ship tries to ram you when it's in the low-middle section of the screen, you probably won't avoid it. And if you do, you might get shot while you're at it. Also, if you stay low, the mouth can open up and fire at you, and the shots are fast, so you have to get back up quickly anyway. Once the chin is destroyed, attack the cannons again for a while, until it looks like the ship is going to charge again. It'll go about halfway and the head will detach from the body and go to the left side of the screen. Get directly between them ASAP, avoiding any cannon fire coming your way. You'll notice that another orange orb has appeared on the body of the ship. Get right up to it and attack. You should easily destroy the entire body of the ship before it can do anything. If you're slow, get out from between the two parts when they pause, because barriers will appear to make it tough for you to get out, and the two parts will come together and smash you. But you shouldn't ever have to deal with it. Anyway, after the body is destroyed, you might think the fight is over, but notice that the head is still there. It moves to the middle of the screen and becomes a mech (be on the left side of the screen, because it moves to the right after it transforms). It'll bounce up and down, firing spread shots at you. Stay on the very left and get between the shots. They keep coming for a while, so don't take a breather. Try to stay in the middle, if you get to the top or the bottom you can end up getting trapped and taking a bullet. After the shots subside, the mech fires a laser that goes straight at you, stops, goes straight at you again, stops, goes straight at you again and disappears. Be kind of high up as it comes, then move down. Wait for it to come at you again, then move left (don't run into the mech). Then move up to avoid it again. After it disappears, the mech extends its arms and another orb bounces back and forth between them. This is the only time you can hurt the boss in this phase. Try to hit the orb as it goes up to the hand in the upper right corner, I think that's the easiest time to hit it. If you miss, the hands will move to different places and the orb keeps bouncing back and forth between them until you hit it. If you wait too long, the orb will probably end up hitting you. After you hit it, the orb disappears, and the mech starts bouncing up and down across the screen, and then back. Stay at the top, and as the mech goes down, fly over him, and do the same thing as he comes back. Then the pattern repeats. Hit the orb about 5 times and you'll win this very long struggle. Stage 7 Still alive? Still willing to beat the game by this point? Well let's do it then! The beginning of this stage isn't exactly simple, though. Mini-boss #1 I thought this was the final battle when I reached here (well, when I played it on Easy, anyway). You do fight Emperor Devotindos here, after all. He'll fire blasts at you from his sword, they alternate between high and low. Jump over the low ones, and do nothing for the high ones. You don't have to duck. Get near the middle of the screen, charge up, and when he fires a low one at you, jump it and rocket into his face. You'll get bounced over to the other side of the screen. Start moving right immediately, and charge up again. The Emperor will jump over to the left and try to smash you, and if you were standing in the right position when you attacked him, he'll miss. Otherwise you won't have enough time to escape and he'll get you. As soon as you're fully charged, jump and rocket into his face again. Then start moving left and charge up, and he'll try to smash you again. Repeat this until you finish off his first phase. It takes good timing to pull it off correctly. As soon as he starts flashing and goes toward the middle, get to one of the sides, because he explodes and his parts fly everywhere, but if you're on the very left or right they won't hit you. The pieces then reform, and then he'll smash the ground. After he does that, rocket into him. He'll float along the top of the screen for a while. Rocket into him a couple more times. He'll pause, and then extend one leg, and then the other at you. Jump over the first leg, and then move forward to avoid the second one. The body will rejoin the legs, attack it while it does this. Then he repeats. It helps to be far away from him when he extends his legs. You ought to be able to kill him after he extends his legs at you the second time. Walk into the teleporter after he dies. Proceed down the hallway, and pay attention to the background. There are prototypes of the Emperor, some of which aren't complete. Watch out for the complete ones, they will come out and run after you. You should be charged up before they come out, and rocket into them as soon as they activate. They'll chase you, but you just need to hit them one more time before they die. They have a delayed death, so don't stop running from them after you hit them. You'll have to kill like 5 of them before you get to the next area. Mini-boss #2 You KNEW he still had to be hanging around. When the lights turn on, go toward Axle and attack (don't get too close, because he might hit you when he attacks). He attacks in the same way you do, firing rings when he swings his sword. If a ring from yours hits his, they both disappear. So whoever attacks faster will hit the other. When Axle is hurt, he spin jumps to another location in the room. Face him and continue attacking. Sometimes he'll try to jump right on top of you. Move to the side and attack him, and then he'll probably jump over you again, so face him and attack again. Don't stop attacking, because if you dawdle after hitting him, he'll attack you instead of jumping. This shouldn't be too hard to get the hang of. When the music stops, he'll crash right through the wall, and you'll be hanging onto one of the pipes in the room to avoid getting sucked out into space. You can move up and down the pipe. Axle will come from above, go up toward him and hit him as he comes down. He'll go in a circular motion, so you'll be able to hit him at the same point every time. After the first time he comes down, though, he'll pause and fire four missiles at you. Just move down and destroy the bottom missile, and you'll be safe. Repeat the pattern: attack as he comes down, then move down and destroy the bottom missile. It shouldn't be long before all the missiles fall out, and he goes to his final phase. He will come up from the bottom, and when he's level with you, he'll spin toward you, then come up from the bottom again and so on. I don't think he can be hurt when he spins, so in order to hit him, figure out how long it takes between his attacks, I think it's like 5 seconds or something. When he's about to come up from the bottom, before he does so, start moving downward. He'll fly up past you, then come back down toward you. Slash away when he gets close, then avoid his spin. The hardest part about it is knowing how long he takes between attacks. Once you've got it down, you should win. Jump into the teleporter that comes down from the ceiling once you've taught him his lesson. 4 more prototypes stand between you and the final boss. The first two are on higher ledges than you, and the second two are on lower ones. For the higher ones, jump and rocket into them, and when they follow you, attack them. For the lower ones, wait for them to jump up to your ledge, then rocket into them. Repeat to kill them. Teleport into the next room. This will be your last respite; there are lots of gems and a couple of 1ups, and you can jump really high in this room, so jump all the way up, and then rocket straight up to get everything. One of the 1ups is at the very top, so jump up to the middle section of the room, jump off it and rocket up to get it. Then go to the middle of the right section of the room, jump straight up and rocket into the teleporter. Final Boss Here it is, the core of the Pig Star, the source of all your problems. You can jump high in this room like you could in the previous room, and you can use this to your advantage. Get on the left when the fight starts. The core bounces around and follows you, trying to smash you. A red orb will stick out from one of the top three holes in the core. Charge up, and when you can, jump up and rocket diagonally down into the orb. Usually you'll have to wait until the core is in the air, then get on one side of it and jump above it. The core pauses when it gets hit, but don't stay near it because it'll resume its attack soon. After you hit it 5 times, it teleports, and then does several attacks without you being able to attack it in return, so just avoid what comes your way. It fires electric beams in 4 different directions at a time, first the straight directions then the diagonal directions. Just don't be under it during the straight beams and be directly under it during the diagonal beams. Then it fires ring lasers in groups of 3. Get right under it to avoid the first group, then get over to the right to avoid the second group, duck to avoid the third group, and get to the left to avoid the fourth. It'll teleport again, then slowly descends, and when it reaches a certain point it'll attack you with either the rings or the beams. If you jump before the core attacks, you can fake it out and it'll attack where you used to be. After it attacks, the orb will appear again, opposite of where you were when it attacked. If you jumped, the orb should appear in one of the bottom 3 holes of the core, so it'll be easy to hit. This phase is probably the easiest one if you jump before he attacks (just don't jump too late, or you'll get hit while in the air). After hitting it 5 times in this phase, it disappears and the music will change. Get in the lower left corner and duck. The core will appear from the top and fire streams that leave ring explosions and circle around him. The streams themselves can't hurt you, but the rings do. After the first one passes you, move over to the right of the core, jump up and rocket straight into the orb, since it'll come through one of the top three holes. If you miss, you won't be able to get hit during your fall, but get ready to avoid anything if necessary. Immediately charge up again, and jump and rocket again. Whenever you hit the core, it'll disappear, and repeat what it did at the beginning of the phase, so get over to the left and duck again. Then go to the right again, jump up and rocket into the orb again. As long as you move along with the rings, you'll be fine. After 5 more hits, the core will reappear in the top middle of the screen, then start moving up and down and firing ring lasers in a counterclockwise manner. The orb will appear in the bottom left or bottom right hole, and it's always the one farthest away from you. You can trick the core, though. As soon as it appears, get underneath the left side of the core, then right as it's about to attack, move over to the right side of it and rocket up into the orb as it comes out. When the core gets hit, it'll repeat, but it gets faster with each hit. If you keep moving to the right at the correct moment and rocket straight up into the orb, you shouldn't get hit. If you get stuck during any of the faster ones, especially on the last hit, you might as well give up, there's probably no way you're gonna hit the target. After the fifth hit in this phase, the core explodes. Head to the right into the teleporter, and in the next room get into the escape pod, and you'll leave the Pig Star right as it explodes. But guess what.you're not done yet. The core is still following you! All you have to do is dodge its attacks in the escape pod, but that's easier said than done. And note that if you lose here, you've gotta go back to the very beginning of the battle. Get over to the right at the beginning, and stay at the bottom the whole time. When the core appears, it'll fire two rings at you, so move all the way left. It fires two more rings, so get back over to the right. When it pauses, hesitate ever so slightly, then move it back over to the left right before it charges at you. If you go too early, it will charge to the left instead, and if you go too late, well, you know what'll happen. After it charges, it'll swing its arms at you. The one farthest away from you will swing forward first, then they alternate. There are 4 swings, 2 with each arm. When you see them begin to swing, move over to avoid the one coming at you, then move back when they swing again. After the arm swings, the pattern repeats. You'll have to endure the pattern several times before you re-enter the atmosphere and the core burns up. If you can get that far, you're done! The game is finally completed. Go celebrate or something! The ending isn't really much different from the other difficulties, but the fact that you did it should mean something. Thank you to Konami for making this great game. Thank you also to all who read this walkthrough and benefit from it. I'm happy to be of help. If you've got any questions or comments, send them to fork@rcsis.com. Copyright 2003 Sean O'Brien. This may be not be reproduced under any circumstances except for personal, private use. It may not be placed on any web site or otherwise distributed publicly without advance written permission. Use of this guide on any other web site or as a part of any public display is strictly prohibited, and a violation of copyright.